


Friends Are The Family You Choose

by Devilc



Category: DCU
Genre: Angst, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-30
Updated: 2010-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-06 19:55:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/57207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devilc/pseuds/Devilc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Owen Mercer discovers the truth about his parents and makes a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friends Are The Family You Choose

**Author's Note:**

> Written before _Infinite Crisis_ and _Outsiders_ #33.
> 
> I've always wondered what it's going to be like when the Flashes discover Owen's relationship to Bart. Oh, poor traumatized Bart (and Wally, and Jay), this angst goes to eleventy one!
> 
> And then I thought but **damn** if it's not going to fuck up Owen, too  finding out that he's the half brother of a superhero, given that he's got some pretty good reasons not to trust the "good guys". ::Wham!:: Story all in my head, waiting to come out.
> 
> I totally love Vange's [Cheap Tricks of All Trades](http://vange.livejournal.com/12445.html), which this story takes as a bit of canon. (And yes, you really should read it before diving in to this, otherwise one of the key points of this isn't really going to make sense [or be as funny].)

A week ago, during a heist gone sideways, Owen managed to lay his hand open with one of his own razor boomerangs. He got distracted for a moment and slice-a-roony. He remembers seeing some of his blood dribble on the floor. He didn't think much of it at the time, not that there was time to wipe it up. There was just enough time for a blink of speed across the room and a dive into the portal that McCulloch was holding open.

Right now he's sitting gingerly on the battered leather couch next to Len, each of them with a brewski cracked open, watching a hockey game. The rest of the guys are gone for the weekend (Len's orders) and the two of them (who got in a huge screaming match after the botched heist and have been giving each other dirty looks ever since) just had the best make-up-sex, _ever_, about half an hour ago, and if not for the fact that he's already not going to be walking right for the next few days, Owen would be up for yet another round  he can never get enough of what Len gives him. He hasn't entirely ruled out a blow job later on, because he loves to make Len squirm and totally lose control, and if Len can't fuck his ass, having Len fuck his mouth is almost just as good.

Len slings an arm over his shoulder along the back of the couch and Owen schooches a tad closer, raises his Schlitz to take a chug and the room just **explodes** in an orgy of spandex.

Fwip! Fwip! Fwip! Fwip! he hurls the rest of the six pack as fast as he can, and has a split second thrill of seeing a can just **nail** Hawkman before he and Len are covered by the technicolor tide.

Hog-tie doesn't begin to describe how he and Len are bound as they are man-handled onto a jet and blasted off to god-knows-where. They sure brought out the big guns for this one. Owen can't see or hear much of anything over the roar of the engines at the moment, but he knows he saw all the Flashes, Hawkman (nursing a _holy shit!_ split lip), Captain Marvel (beer soaked), Batman, Superman, Wonder-Woman (pretty sure he dinged her, too), Power Girl, and other people he presumes are JLA/JSAers, and just before they slipped a hood over his head, Owen saw it in Len's eyes too _**WTF?!!** All they did was try and knock over a bank. Nobody died, either._

And now they've jerked him up, untied his legs, and they're marching him out of the plane and down what sounds like a hall. Whatever it is, it just reeks of antiseptic, and Owen's just seething with rage (and fear) because these are the bastards that (a) fucking lied to his face and treated him like a shit-nobody at the scene when he tried to find out what had happened to his dad on the night he died, and (b) then went on to turn his dad into some sort of fucking re-animator science experiment, and he'll be fucked if he doesn't fight them every step of the way.

Through his hood he keeps saying he wants a lawyer, that he's not saying jack and shit until he gets an attorney. They stop, and he tenses, ready to fight. Sure, he's cuffed and hooded, and he's got some sort of inhibitor on him because he can't touch, much less feel, that precious sliver of speed  but he's not going down easy. Just as Owen sucks in a deep breath, his legs get kicked out from under him, and they pick him up and he's thrashing and twisting for all he's worth, but it's just not enough and ...

_... **ohgod** they've strapped him to a gurney!!!_ Livewire adrenaline jolt of pure fear corkscrews through him and he screams curses at them and thrashes (the cuffs on his arms digging cruelly into his wrists and back) and weeps beneath the mask as he feels and hears the scissors cutting off his shirt and jeans because _ohgod, not like this, not like this! God**damn** them, not like this!_

He sucks in another breath of air to cuss them out as his ruined clothes are pulled away, and in that split second, he hears a collective gasp and then, "Oh my God." The first thing any of them have said that's not strictly procedural since they bundled him and Len on to the plane, and there's a long pause, broken only by the buzzing of the lights overhead and the beeping of some kind of machine, and then, so softly Owen can barely hear it, "Get a kit."

"I'm sorry, Midnite, I didn't catch that."

"I said, 'get a kit"!" Hissed. _Pissed_.

And though he can't see a thing, Owen can sense the change in the air. As if all the tension on their end has drained away, turned to something else, but he can't figure out what. Well, it hasn't changed, not on his end, and Owen fights them as they unstrap his chest and undo the cuffs, pulling his arms out from underneath him, and finally get them tied to the bed rails. (He gets one good punch in, at least.) The air around him is filled with soft, soothing murmurs and he could swear he overhears something about fucking Stockholm Syndrome. _WTF?!_

Owen decides to lie still. All this thrashing, it's got him all wound up and it's not doing a damn thing. No, he needs to lay back and think, make a plan, the way Len taught him.

He hears a camera taking pictures, and just when he thinks it can't get any worse, the scissors return and Owen feels his face flame in indignation and rage as they cut his jockeys away. Because, God, these fucking sickos, they probably did this to his dad, too, and he tries very hard not to think about whatever this kit of theirs is, and what it's got to do with his privates, but his mind is awash in images of electrodes and torture.

And then 

"Uh, Owen ..." from right around his hips, in that soothing voice a doctor uses right before he's going to do something that really fucking hurts, "I'm going to, uh, take a couple of swabs and then we'll, um, clean up some of these bites. Can't really do anything for the bruises, though. Sorry."

That's when it all slams together.

The kit is a fucking _RAPE_ kit.

Owen doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. He does a bit of both.

And bites somebody damn well and good when they peel up the hood enough to try and do an oral swab.

~oo(0)oo~

He's kept tied to the bed for three days. Naked under the sheets. _Catheterized_. He answers every question with "I want my lawyer", "Where's the writ of habeas corpus, asshole", or "Fuck off".

Everybody who comes in to talk to him is so sympathetic, and "there there" and "understands" why he's "acting out". He wants to scream. Jesus Fuck Christ, he vows, he will never, ever, rape another person, because, shit, if this is how they treat you afterwards .... It's not the rapist who makes a victim, it's the everybody else and the damned pity in their eyes, and how they won't really look at you, just all around you.

~oo(0)oo~

Three massive orderlies enter the room with a set of clean scrubs, a small bag of toiletries, and tray of food (and the smell makes Owen's stomach growl loudly) and tell him they are going to take out his IV drip, the catheter, untie him, and let him get dressed.

The voice of Len whispers in his ear that beating and restraints aren't going to help him escape. Owen does nothing as they unplug, untie, untube, and unstrap him before leaving. He grabs the toiletries kit and toddles on stiff legs into the bathroom.

It's not a hot shower, but a "PTA bath" in the sink makes him feel better, and he's amazed at how much grunge accumulated on his teeth in such a short time even though he hasn't eaten a damn thing since he got here. He'll never take that clean and minty feeling for granted again.

The scrubs are about twenty sizes too big. But they're still slightly warm from the drier, and Owen's always liked that April Fresh scent.

Lunch is a bowl of chicken broth and a small cup of red jello. At first Owen's just pissed that they're giving him such crap food until he recalls a fragment of something Dr. Midnite said to him yesterday, and then he just giggles inside, because damn, if he had known about eating a liquid diet before, he could have saved himself a certain amount of discomfort since he fell in with the Rogues.

Next he's marched down the hall by the same three orderlies and he cases the joint as they stroll along, making note of every detail and trying to figure the angle on it.

Oh, a therapist's office. Great. She gives a nice little canned spiel about how they're going to be working together to help him own his _real_ feelings, but in the meantime there's a few questions he's got to answer, and answering them truthfully as he can, and listening to what these men have to say is the first step to getting back on the road to the "the real Owen Mercer" and she'll be in the room with him to lend him support because she understands that this must be incredibly hard and stressful for him right now.

_Oh, you have no fucking idea, cunt,_ Owen thinks, but he says, "Yeah, lady, whatever. Oh, and it's Harkness, not Mercer."

She sighs and makes a note on her clipboard.

They take him to what's clearly an interrogation room and cuff one of his wrists to the table.

All of the Flashes walk in, looking incredibly grim.

Great. Owen decides to beat them to the punch. "Where's Len? What have you fuckers done with him?"

Old Grey Flash says, "He's in Iron Heights."

"For now," His Flash adds with a gusty sigh.

Kid Flash just gives him this look that Owen can't figure out. He's so wound up about something he's actually vibrating.

"I want to see him."

"Uh, Owen, now's not the right time in your recovery for you to confront Captain Cold ..." his therapist says in a soothing voice, and Owen rolls his eyes and wants to smack the bitch something fierce.

"I want proof that he's alive and not some fucking science experiment like my dad." Try as he might, he can't keep the waver out of his voice.

"What?" asks His Flash.

"Oh, don't play me like that, okay? _Jesus!_ Ain't I been crapped on enough?!"

The three of them look at each other for a moment, and His Flash shrugs.

Owen gives a big sigh. "Look, if this is how you want to play it, just ask me what you wanted to ask me."

"Ma'am" His Flash says, "This is a really sensitive issue. Can we have a moment alone?"

"Oh, I'm sorry," she begins in that saccharine sweet voice,"but, what is said here, I need to know, besides, Mr. Bones says "

But before she can finish, Old Grey Flash, who had looked rather pissed as soon as she opened her mouth to start putting a sugar coat on 'no', hustles her out of the room in a blur of light and sound.

And despite everything, Owen's got to give him props for that.

An instant after the door bangs shut, Kid Flash looks at him and asks, "Do you know who your mom is?"

_WTF?!_ "Why do you care?" he snaps.

His Flash says, "Look. Do you know anything about your mom?"

A scuffle at the door. Old Grey Flash says quite clearly, "Over my dead body." And Owen's got to snort at that. Len was right, Old Grey Flash has still got a certain code.

What the hell, because of that, he'll throw them a bone. "It's not Golden Glider, if that's what you're getting at."

And he can tell by the looks on their faces that (a) they know she's not, and (b) they know that he knows she's not.

Fine. Whatever. "Right. About two years ago, Cold and I, we tracked down this woman, Ashley Zolomon "

"Go on," His Flash says in a tight voice.

Owen flips him the bird and says, "She was in the room with my dad, when they were " he can't keep the bitterness out of his voice. He sucks in a breath and starts over, "We talked to her. We didn't hurt her or nothing. She said that my dad told her my mother is some woman named Meloni Thawne." He glances down at the Formica on the table, not wanting them to see the disappointment in his eyes. "But that's a dead end, because Captain Cold and I, we looked, and I mean we _really_ looked, and we can't find any trace of a Meloni Thawne, anywhere. So, I guess the joke's on" He glances up again. Both of them are deathly pale, and Kid Flash looks like he's going to sick up " me..." Owen finishes weakly.

Pause. The room is silent. Too silent.

"What?" He asks.

Nothing.

He shoots to his feet, screaming, "Fucking tell me! What! Goddamnit! I can tell you know who she is! What do you know about my mom?"

His Flash takes a deep breath and says, "Last week, you cut yourself. We got your DNA from the blood, and when we put it in our database 

In a teeny tiny voice Kid Flash cuts in, "She's my mom, too."

And Owen has to laugh, because there's nothing left to do **but** laugh so hard you cry at just how incredibly, cosmically fucked this is, and then his legs buckle and he's spewing magenta colored chicken jello broth all over the floor.

They're out of the room so fast it's blink and you miss it.

His therapist rushes back in and tries to mother-hen him. He kicks her, hard as he can, in the left shin.

Her hand snakes out and she slaps him hard across the face. The sound is like a whip-crack.

Owen smiles. If nothing else, he finally got a genuine reaction out of her.

~oo(0)oo~

A lot of sessions follow over the next three weeks. They're all the same, all about helping him adjust to what his new life will be like and getting to know his "real" family.

Except for the one where they're so obviously trying to make this a breakthrough session, and oh so delicately, oh so tactfully, all "we know how hard it is for men to talk about this but we're your family" (and it turns out Old Grey Flash isn't actually his family, but he's raising Kid Flash, so in some ways, he sort of is family) as they raise the topic of his being raped.

The expression on their faces is priceless when he looks them dead on and calmly explains that no, he's known since the age of 13 that he's queer, he happens to like his buttsex rough, and Len  who is a great fuck by the way  was more than happy to oblige.

Since the truth hurts them so much, he also tells them all about getting the brush off the night his father was killed, about seeing his father's body in that lab, all Frankensteined out, about how the JLA has been doing mind wipes (His Flash flinches at that  _busted_!) and how the Rogues would never,ever, sink so low as any of that.

And that he has no intention of ever calling _any_ of them his kin, because the Rogues are his family, now and forever, world without end, amen.

His therapist starts to say something revoltingly perky and Kid Flash gives her this _look_ with those weird yellow eyes of his, and tells her to shut up.

~oo(0)oo~

Two days later, he's brushing his teeth and looking at his reflection in the mirror, when it shifts. (The assholes were **stupid** enough to put him in a room with a mirror, so it's only been a matter of time, really.) It takes all of a second for Owen to step up on the sink and dive on through 

 straight into an anonymous, grungy warehouse. It could be the old one, except the TV's bigger, and the couch in front of it is black leather, not brown.

It takes about two seconds and a carefully aimed blast from Len's gun to get the inhibitor collar off. And, typical Len, totally understated: "It's good to have you back, Captain Boomerang."

"It's good to be back with my family, Captain Cold."

~oo(0)oo~

Late, late, that night when everybody else is dead drunk asleep, Len pauses in the middle of putting a "ring of roses" around Owen's neck and says, "D'ja know that one of the things they charged me with was rape?"

"Did you know they swabbed my ass to prove it?" Owen replies.

Len gives a snort and then another hard, biting suck to his neck, and Owen feels his eyes roll up in his head from how damn _good_ it feels. "I was wondering where the fuck that charge came from," Len says when he comes up for air.

"Oh  Jesus, Len!" He swears Len just left the world's darkest hickey on his neck"  Oh, it was a laugh riot on my end."

Len snickers and brushes his hand across Owen's chest, heading towards his nipples...._OhJesusGod! Len's hand, it, shit, ohgodlikethat!_ And Owen can feel his dick give a huge spurt of pre-come, something that always amuses Len.

"Tell me, Len," Owen gasps out when the the blood comes back to his brain. "How'd you find me?"

Len stops, idly trailing a finger down Owen's side, "Damnedest thing," he says after a moment. "An anonymous note. Gave your room number and everything."

Owen sucks a kiss from Len, putting a bit of teeth in it  because, hey, Len likes a bit of aggression, too. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. There was a message for you, too. Something about how blood is thicker than water, and they haven't turned their backs on you, but they understand that right now's not the right time." Pause. "I take it that makes sense to you?"

"Yeah." Owen nods. "It does."

"Care to explain?"

"Fuck me hard enough and I " Len dives in with an enthusiasm that makes Owen's voice crack " might."

Pause.

"You're a sneaky bastard sometimes, Boomerang. I like that in a fellow."

"Rogue to the core, Cold. Rogue to the core."


End file.
